RISING CHEFS 2007

Movie stars might not pass through Degustation, the tiny 19-seat tapas bar-style restaurant in New York’s East Village, but it certainly gets its share of the city’s top chefs. Daniel Humm, David Chang and Thomas Keller have all come by the restaurant to sample the cooking of 28-year-old executive chef Wesley Genovart. He commands the open kitchen with aplomb, using immersion circulators and other tools familiar in the arsenal of avant-garde cooks like Ferran Adrià to create elegant dishes, plating each with precision right before diners’ eyes. Genovart, who was raised on the Spanish island of Majorca and in Fresno, California, has spent time in both Spanish and American kitchens. He worked in the Basque country, in Boston with Ken Oringer at Clio and at Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s Perry St. before being hand-picked to helm Degustation. There, his skilled French technique and knowledge of Spanish tradition ensure artful reinterpretations and deconstructions that keep bringing top chefs, and a growing legion of dedicated diners, back for more.